To think the lockdown needs to end now?

[Fr0thandBubble]

I could understand a lockdown being imposed for a few weeks to make sure the NHS was up to capacity, but it’s gone well beyond that. The NHS now has lots of excess capacity and yet here we still are.

I am horrified by what has happened to our civil liberties, what it’s doing to our children’s education, what it’s doing to everyone’s livelihoods and mental health, what it’s doing to the economy, how people are not getting life-saving treatment for things like cancer, etc.

I don’t understand why people aren’t given the right to choose to self-isolate if they need to but for the rest of us to be allowed to get on with our lives and to take responsibility for ourselves.

I don’t understand why people who are not old and don’t have underlying health conditions are acting hysterically and why people have decided it’s OK to police other people’s behaviour and shout at them in the street.

I feel like I’m living in some kind of awful dystopian society.

I realise I’m in the minority here but does anyone agree with me?

@Typohere

People do seem to be waking up. Thank goodness and the hysterical shrieking will be listened to less and less as time goes on. They can then continue with their miserable moaning lives.

I do hope so.

I don't think people understand the reality of the situation. "Everyone has gone back to work apart from pub/club employees" - ha! ha! I work in a head office and I'm furloughed, in fact I know people in office jobs in all sorts of industries furloughed and likely to lose their jobs as the work has just dried up. People working in clinical trials for cancer drugs have been furloughed as the trials have all been paused, people working in head office for retail designing make-up stands, data analysts in travel. A lot of these people won't ever get their jobs back. Look at all the companies that have gone bankrupt or announced redundancies. It's not just bar staff ffs.

Great news for us in Wales here. Finally our children can have some education, regardless of their age and spend time with peers! Wonderful I'm feeling so happy about it.

@BeijingBikini these are all deaths where Covid is mentioned on the death certificate. Conversely, we now know that Covid can cause blood clotting, heart attacks and strokes even in otherwise healthy young people. Many of these would not have been identified as Covid related.

As for “probably 2-4 have absolutely no symptoms” - we just don’t have the data to say this at this point. Estimates of asymptomatic cases range from 5-40% - because nobody knows yet for sure. It’s worth noting that many asymptomatic cases do go on to develop symptoms. Or there are side effects like the Kawasaki like illness in children, which develops as long as 4-6 weeks after the initial Covid infection.
Also X rays have shown ground glass effect in the lungs of patients who had the mildest symptoms - and we don’t know the long term implications of that. In SARS patients this showed as long term lung damage.
In hospital patients Covid has been shown to attack the kidneys, heart and brain directly - we don’t know how widespread that is yet.
The fact is that this is a new and very nasty illness. We know precious little about it at this point, and that includes how to treat it.

Oh and also your logic at the end is faulty - the deaths so far would have been the weakest people who were most likely to die from it, or "low hanging fruit" as I've seen it put elsewhere.
It’s not necessarily the case that vulnerable people are more likely to catch it. Just that once they catch it they are more likely to die from it.
In fact, vulnerable people have been more likely to be very careful to avoid it- see the 2 million who are shielded.

Agree @BeijingBikini DH is in construction - which, according to many people 'never stopped'. He's been furloughed since early April and went back on Monday. Out of approx. 230 employees, 80 are still furloughed. A few are furloughed for shielding reasons, the rest are because there's no work.

@MarinePsychiatrist

Thanks to lockdown only 7% of the population have had it

What's the evidence for that?

Antibody tests www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52837593

Chester Zoo has put out an appeal. Ordered to stay closed indefinitely. They have hit the wall. They aren't alone. How much longer can this go on. A country which won't work, a country which won't send kids to school, an inept govt

Anyone who is vulnerable should be allowed to self-isolate but why are the rest of us having to sacrifice our health, livelihoods and liberties?

This really boils my blood. Do you know how many people are vulnerable? 20 million, give or take. You really think that we can manage without 20 million people do you? You think your life will carry on unabated with bus drivers, teachers, doctors, nurses, shop workers, engineers, plumbers, postmen, lorry drivers etc etc etc all isolating? No, of course it wouldn't. So what you are actually calling for is for people who are vulnerable to this to just put up and shut up and get out there in harm's way so that you can do what you want to do, having deemed yourself to be low risk.

As for capacity in hospitals, well, whoop di doo. There might well be vacant beds right now but do you want to get this severe enough to be admitted to hospital when there is no treatment available? Big deal that there's a bed there for you because there's precious little else that can be done to help you.

@PinkiOcelot

There’s a group on FB called Yellow Hearts. It’s for people who have lost loved ones due to Covid. Some people have lost both parents, younger siblings etc. All heartbreaking stories.

Go on there and express your wishes to go to the shop when you like, visit who you like when you like and flock to a crowded beach!!

Well said.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras

Anyone who is vulnerable should be allowed to self-isolate but why are the rest of us having to sacrifice our health, livelihoods and liberties?

This really boils my blood. Do you know how many people are vulnerable? 20 million, give or take. You really think that we can manage without 20 million people do you? You think your life will carry on unabated with bus drivers, teachers, doctors, nurses, shop workers, engineers, plumbers, postmen, lorry drivers etc etc etc all isolating? No, of course it wouldn't. So what you are actually calling for is for people who are vulnerable to this to just put up and shut up and get out there in harm's way so that you can do what you want to do, having deemed yourself to be low risk.

As for capacity in hospitals, well, whoop di doo. There might well be vacant beds right now but do you want to get this severe enough to be admitted to hospital when there is no treatment available? Big deal that there's a bed there for you because there's precious little else that can be done to help you.

Yep. Once you’re in hospital the fatality rate for Covid is 35-40%.

But yeah, tell yourselves it’s just a little flu.

So what you are actually calling for is for people who are vulnerable to this to just put up and shut up and get out there in harm's way so that you can do what you want to do, having deemed yourself to be low risk.

Without getting into your many issues hear, someone’s got to work to raise the revenue to fund the NHS that everyone’s reliant on.

I doubt the doctors and nurses will work for thin air.

Me and my family are under 50, slim and healthy with plenty of vitamin D/C - so in all likelihood we won't need treatment. I'm pretty sure I've had it. But I would happily sign a waiver saying "no hospital treatment" if it meant I could go back to normal, yes.

Will you also undertake to stay away from other people too - so no public transport, children not in school, not going to the shops or drs, because if you have it you risk spreading it to people either working or needing to use those services. Just because you've decided you aren't at risk it doesn't mean you won't infect someone who.is at risk.

EarlyGrey it makes perfect sense for the shielded to continue shielding, and also it makes perfect sense to allow people who don't want to leave their houses to do so and allow everyone else willing to risk it, to go out and start the country going again.

You just need to forfeit your income and sign on to UC for others to take the risk. We risk our lives, you risk financial security.

We're all in this together remember, sacrifices need to be made 🤷🏻‍♀️

LaurieMarlow

I'm not denying that but to glibly say "let the vulnerable self isolate" without a clue as to what they are talking about is very "let them eat cake". People who say this assume the vulnerable are the two million who are shielded, who apparently are the low hanging fruit described earlier, not the very many people who are currently working to keep society going. They aren't being given the option of self isolating, so those of you arguing for lockdown to be lifted because you aren't personally vulnerable are arguing to put these people at risk to benefit you. That's disgusting. Why aren't you arguing for government to follow good scientific advice to lift this safely? There is so much that can be done to make this as safe as possible and yet so many people just want their way, right now.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras

Anyone who is vulnerable should be allowed to self-isolate but why are the rest of us having to sacrifice our health, livelihoods and liberties?

This really boils my blood. Do you know how many people are vulnerable? 20 million, give or take. You really think that we can manage without 20 million people do you? You think your life will carry on unabated with bus drivers, teachers, doctors, nurses, shop workers, engineers, plumbers, postmen, lorry drivers etc etc etc all isolating? No, of course it wouldn't. So what you are actually calling for is for people who are vulnerable to this to just put up and shut up and get out there in harm's way so that you can do what you want to do, having deemed yourself to be low risk.

As for capacity in hospitals, well, whoop di doo. There might well be vacant beds right now but do you want to get this severe enough to be admitted to hospital when there is no treatment available? Big deal that there's a bed there for you because there's precious little else that can be done to help you.

How many of those 20 million are net contributors to the economy? Given that only 30 million people in the UK are in work (either employed or self employed) I would wager that a large chunk of the shielded do not work. Therefore getting the non shielded workforce back up and running will benefit everyone

Before I start, I'm autistic and have a thing about looking at actual numbers. Not the headline numbers but the ones that don't seem to be getting shouted about in the press (or are simply glossed over). I also struggle with getting massively emotional over things, I admit I don't have empathy in the same way an NT does. Also apart from the gym being shut and one of my children only getting 1 week in 3 at school my life is now near enough normal for me.

But I do still think lockdown should be eased at as quick a rate as possible. And possibly not have been implemented in the first place.

And here are my reasons :

1. The peak death rate was very clearly the 8th April, 2 weeks after lockdown started. But from what I've read the average timescale from infection to death is 3 weeks (5-14days incubation/7-10days before reaching crisis point/+time on incubator)....so that would be the week before lockdown when everyone became a little more cautious.

1. The virus is clearly very discrimatory, although there are a few outliers, it most severely affects those who are elderly and/or frail. These are the people who should have been protected. Hospitals should not have sent people into care homes to clear beds. 1/4 of deaths have been in care homes.

1. Up to 40% are asymptomatic, this was previously put at 20%, at the time when we were told that of the of 80% 20% would need hospital treatment, therefore the actual percentage that need hospital treatment is lower.

1. The hospital capacity was never even close to being overwhelmed, new hospitals were built and not used (PPE is a different matter)

1. The death rate in hospital (all causes) in the latest figures was 24% below the 5 year average (I'm not sure which week it was, as this was hidden within a doom and gloom report). So is no-one dying of anything else, or have some of those that have died in the last few months simply been taken a few weeks/months before their time and would have died if they had caught any other viral or bacterial infection.

1. Contrary to the headline numbers, deaths per day have been hovering at around the 100-150 mark for the last 2 weeks. There is a big difference between deaths reported and reported deaths. This is despite VE day, that some predicted should have caused a spike.

1. As sad as people dying of CV is, it seems nothing else matters. Our children's education and development doesn't matter. Mental health doesn't matter, job losses don't matter, women and children living in abusive homes don't matter, only COVID matters. Before 23rd March if you kept a healthy child isolated at home, not seeing anyone outside the house it would be considered child abuse.

1. I have vulnerable family and believe me, they say stop the lockdown. They don't want to see their grandchildren's lives being destroyed.

1. I genuinely think that with the way the virus has ravaged care homes and hospitals, hitting those very people it seems to target the worst, the death rate would naturally be coming down now as it has fewer of that demographic to infect.

10. COVID is not the only nasty illness out there. I had a "mystery respiratory virus" over Christmas, it knocked me for 6, and I mean really made me ill, I felt like I was dying at the worst). It took me, a marathon runner, a good 4-5 months to get my fitness back. I'm not saying it was COVID (although I'd quite like an antibody test), but whatever it was, was just as serious and would probably have killed many of the same demographic that are dying from/with COVID. (Oh and that virus rampaged through the mainly under 50s, in my local area, and probably only didn't hit the older age groups because it was winter and they were mostly inside)

BeijingBikini - i too know many people who are Still furloughed. NONE of them work in hospitality, they all work for small businesses that have no link to hospitality whatsoever. I know of one person who has been given a return to work date, just one.

Covid can cause blood clotting, heart attacks and strokes even in otherwise healthy young people. Many of these would not have been identified as Covid related

No maybe not. But some of these people will have died needlessly because they were too scared to go to hospital or couldn't get seen.

I can't help but feel we should have continued the way that sweden has, the world is going to be a different place after all of this

I think a lot of people who truly need to see doctors for other underlining health conditions are being seriously overlooked right now.

@MigGril

If anything the numbers are more conservative then they would have been 3 months ago as we know now that up to 40% of people are asymptomatic. Higher then previously thought.

Spain's results are most likely due to their very strict lockdown. Risking opening their boards now is not a very good idea.

The Spanish flu (I know totally different virus) caused problems for around 2 years. Until it finally mutated into a less deadly foarm. Maybe his virus will do so faster, maybe we'll find better ways to treat it. Who knows but until then it's still quite a theat and while I don't want to live in lockdown. Feel it does need to spread through the population. Opening everything up fully is really not the way to go either.

Many other things can cause economic uncertainty. Life is unpredictable, I'm wondering if I'll have a job at the end of this. But it won't e the first time I've been in this position so will just get on with it.

Having a very strict lockdown in Spain was certainly helpful when the priority number 1 was to be able to hospitalize everyone who needed it, flattening the curve.

However, it does not explain the extreme descent of new cases and new deaths, up to 0 deaths on 2nd June, when it's been weeks that we are back to work, on the streets etc.. The only possible explanations are:

1. Herd immunity (not very probable, it was a very strict lockdown for more than two months in Spain)
2. Weather change, higher temperature (possible, but not very probable, considering that South America is now suffering an outbreak)
3. Virus mutation (weakening after certain period) - I really believe this is the cause of the drop, it was demonstrated on empiric level by Israeli mathematicians and explained by Luc Montagnier, a very excentric Nobel prize virologist, who may be right or may be totally crazy, but his explanation is logical and it is currently being backed up by data.

His hypotesis was that the virus was made in a lab and that some sequences of its dna were modified by adding some sequences of HIV, which are not harmful in themselves, but whose role is to confuse our immune system. Since the mother nature has a tendency to achieve harmony in everything, even in a virus, its mutations gradually expel the HIV sequences which were artificially added to the code, leaving the covid-19 as just another coronavirus that our body can quickly identify and fight agains. He also said (independently from the Israeli mathematicians) that these mutations seem to take place in approx. 70 days.

Yep. Once you’re in hospital the fatality rate for Covid is 35-40%

Nope. That's not true.

The country is broken the longer this madness goes on the less chance recovery

My low hanging fruit dh is shielding but also working full time from home and will probably continue to do so for some time. He is lucky in that respect.